Women are much better at spotting a cute baby than men, according
to university research out Wednesday.

Psychologists at the University of St Andrews in Scotland used
computer image manipulation to produce subtle variations in baby faces.

They found that women could distinguish a "cute" baby --
chubby cheeks, large forehead, big round eyes and button nose -- far
more easily than men, who struggled to spot the difference.

The researchers believe that cuteness sensitivity may be down to
female hormones.

"We found that young women between 19-26 and (women aged)
45-51 years were more sensitive to differences in infant cuteness than
men aged 19-26 and 53-60 years," said Doctor Reiner Sprengelmeyer.

However, women aged 53-60 performed at the same level as men in
determining the "cuteness" of the newborns.

"Because average age at menopause is 51 years in the UK, these
findings suggest the possible involvement of reproductive hormones in
cuteness sensitivity," Sprengelmeyer said.

"We therefore compared cuteness discrimination in pre- and
post-menopausal women of the same age alongside women taking and not
taking oral contraceptives (progesterone and oestrogen).

"Pre-menopausal women and young women taking oral
contraceptives -- which raise hormone levels artificially -- were more
sensitive to variations of cuteness than their respective comparison
groups."

Psychologists at St Andrews conducted the research along with
colleagues from the universities of Bern in Switzerland, Bielefeld in
Germany and York in England.

They chose 10 images from a pool of more than 100 baby pictures and
combined them into a composite of a "cute" baby face.

They repeated the process to create a less "cute" baby
face.

The findings led them to suggest that cuteness sensitivity is
modulated by female reproductive hormones.

Sprengelmeyer said: "Given that cuteness is considered an
indicator of being young, helpless, and in need of care, we hypothesise that the ability to detect small variations in the degree of cuteness
may have evolved to guide the allocation of necessary maternal resources
to the infant."

Further research will explore whether cuteness sensitivity is
implicated in post-natal depression.- AFP

Daily NewsEgypt 2009

Provided by Syndigate.info an Albawaba.com company

COPYRIGHT 2009 Al Bawaba (Middle East) Ltd.
No portion of this article can be reproduced without the express written permission from the copyright holder.